


keep looking

by archival_hogwash



Category: Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016), Star Wars - All Media Types
Genre: Bodhi Rook Needs a Hug, Can You Tell the Author Listens to Way Too Many Podcasts?!, Character Study, Gen, He Gets Podcasts Instead, Long-Distance Space Travel is Long, POV Bodhi Rook, Podcasts IN SPACE, Pre-Rogue One
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-10
Updated: 2017-03-10
Packaged: 2018-10-01 15:58:53
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 812
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10193489
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/archival_hogwash/pseuds/archival_hogwash
Summary: In which Bodhi Rook, space!podcast junkie, discovers a new favorite serial--and begins to question his allegiances.





	

**Author's Note:**

> [shouts out to Riz Ahmed for the headcanon that brought this nonsense to life; you are an inspirational human being and also a fucking mathematical impossibility you gorgeous ass]

Ask any self-respecting long-haul cargo pilot in the galaxy how they fend off the maddening isolation of deep space travel, and they'll run you down the laundry list of tips, tricks, and tools they rely on to distract themselves until they (and you) are blue in the face.

Ask Bodhi Rook, and he'll talk your ear off about his favorite transcasts.

In the whole time he was at the Academy, no one asked.

* * *

 

*bip*

Bodhi jerked awake, blinking the fatigue from his eyes as he wobbled back upright in his seat. The shuttle cabin was unexpectedly quiet, save for the gentle electric thrum of the instrument panel. He blinked again, hard, fighting to keep his drooping eyelids open, and groped beside him for the thin vial of stims. He flipped the lid open—the metallic clink rang through the cabin with unexpected force—and shook three small blue capsules out onto his palm.

_Swallow. Swallow. Head back. Throat open. In. Swallow. Swallow._

Bodhi shuddered as the stims went down, and swallowed one last time to wash the taste of sugary-bitter powder from his mouth. He let his already bleary gaze drift out in front of him, and he let his eyes dance slowly across the shimmering field of the warp tunnel.

This was, what? The third time this cycle? _Fuck._

Bodhi snapped his head up to the spot just to the right of the transparisteel viewport, the one where he’d found—entirely by accident, mind, during a cursory inspection of a hairline crack on the interior of the viewport—that pinhole camera. After half a minute, feeling confident that he’d won the staring contest with whoever was behind the tiny black lens, he heaved a jagged sigh and ran his hand through his sleep-mussed queue.

“ _Fuck me_ … I can’t keep doing that, _shit_...”

Bodhi carried on muttering—“...really, _really_ hope no one saw that… _no_ end of shit if Yorin catches me falling asleep mid-warp…”—as he quickly rolled his shoulders loose and leaned forward to the navicomputer. A quick tap on the touchscreen brought it out of screen-save and back to that familiar interface, the one he never closed.

(Technically, he did have to close it to do things like enter warp coordinates or guide his shuttle down to a landing pad, but that was the _only_ time. The only times, right, two things. The _only_ times.)

Bodhi hummed gently to himself as he scrolled through his transcast library. Two pages in, however, none of the newest crop of updates really stood out. He huffed a sigh of disappointment, and flicked back to his list of favorites.

_Hold That Thought, I Don’t Wanna Know?_

“Wynssa Starflare’s the guest this episode? Huh…” Bodhi shrugged, and swiped up. “Nah, not tonight…”

_Shuttle Talk?_

Bodhi snorted at a sudden flash of memory from the last episode (seriously, trying to manually bypass a compressor on a warp drive? Who _does_ that?) and reached out to swipe up again—and froze.

_Ahch-To? AHCH-TO UPDATED?!_

Bodhi’s face split in a blinding grin and he wiggled excitedly in his seat as he thrust his arm up in a victorious fist pump—and promptly clipped his elbow on the armrest. He winced and rubbed at his stinging elbow as he gingerly reached forward to tap _play_.

_Hey everyone, it's Nik. If you enjoy "Ahch-To", you're going to love "Highness", the newest transcast from Corellian Beltway Stories. One CBS reviewer described it as "the best way to get your fix of deep-diving investigative_ _journalism through a captivating portrait of a long-forgotten history. Subscribe at the imperialNet transcast hub, or directly at the "Highness" hub on CBS._

Bodhi sat back in his chair at the announcement, brow furrowed in thought. "Investigative journalism" and "long-forgotten history" were exactly what got him hooked on  _Ahch-To_ in the first place, and so far no other transcast he'd ever listened to managed to strike that balance. He blinked, nodded, blinked again, and half-shrugged. "Yeah, why not," he said, tapping out of the favorites menu to the search bar for the iNet catalog.

The first hit for  _Highness_ was indeed produced by Corellian Beltway Stories, which he took as a good sign (filtering out pirated transcasts from the iNet catalog had become increasingly difficult since the Rebellion's propaganda machine had ramped up in the last few cycles), so Bodhi downloaded the first full episode and hit the subscribe button as he tapped out of the search. 

When the episode finally appeared in the transcast play window, he paused. The cover art was uncharacteristically...pretty, for a CBS transcast. He could just make out the silhouette of a small woman in a long, sweeping gown and an elaborate headpiece against the deep, velvety blue background. "Wonder which _Highness_ it's gonna be..." he mused.

One deep breath and one quirk of a smile later, Bodhi Rook pressed _play_.

**Author's Note:**

> reeeeeeeeeally not sure where this is going... bear with me?
> 
> Ten points and a large Internet hug to anyone who can guess which random-ass podcasts made their appearance in this chapter


End file.
